Bronica Medium Format Owners Thread

I'm really pleased this thread has risen from the deep sleep it was in (lockdown?). I suppose in England now (from Wednesday) an outing with the camera is allowed since there's no limit to how far you can drive and you don't even need to be exercising just going out for pleasure so a trip up the moors (insert your favorite location) for some landscape photography is no longer against the rules so my Bronica may well see some exercise in the near future.
 
Not so with us here in the Isle of Man Paul. Lockdown is still very real here. No planes or ships in or out, with the exception of essential services/items. Thought we can now 'visit' family, in their gardens, respecting appropriate distancing..!!
Having said that, it's amazing what you can find to photograph right on your doorstep, or even in your garden. I'm on my 4th roll of film through my ETRSi, no idea when I'm likely to be able to get them processed as there is no-one on the Island who does D&P, or scanning..!!
But, strange as it may sound, I'm quite getting to like the fact that I've got to 'wait and see'. Instant results from my Nikon DSLR's are ok but the process doesn't have the subtlety or 'gentleness' that film, and 120 film in particular, has. I took two photographs yesterday in glorious sunshine.. start to finish was 80+ minutes..!! It's almost like time slows down when I look down through the viewfinder. I can see so much more. It's wonderful.
I'm not expecting great results from the first rolls of film, just enough to let me know where I need to improve. At nearly 70 I know there's so much more to learn and that makes me even keener to improve.
Stay well, keep safe.

PS: Which moors are you referring to? I used to go deer stalking up on the Yorkshire moors near Northallerton and Helmsley.
 
Topsy said:
Dartmoor.
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Ah.. t'other end of the country. Not been out there but I have been on the deer in Dorset and Hampshire. Hitch hiked across Bodmin Moor one very dark October day 50 years ago... scary place Bodmin Moor..!! Use to drink in the Sailor's Arms in Newquay when I did a spell at St Mawgan (Army stuff).
 
Another thought that comes to mind, it may have already been asked by someone, what's the general consensus regarding how you carry your Bronica? I'm aware of the lugs on the camera body and how a strap attaches, but do people actually just let their camera 'dangle' on a strap? Seems a bit precarious to me.
 
I let mine dangle. The same with my RZ67 which is slightly larger than my ETRS.
 
I usually use a Joby sling strap that screws into the tripod screw hole for all my cameras (except the MPP :) ) I find it much more comfortable and its easy to rest a hand on the camera whilst walking
 
Just taken delivery of a AEII prism head which I got for a steal price of £70.00 on eBay. It's in immaculate condition, can't find a mark on it and the optics look superb. The only niggle is the 'Auto-Manual' setting dial seems mighty stiff. Could be this is intentional but I have no experience of this prism finder so I can't be certain. Any thoughts chaps? (It certainly adds a good bit of weight to the outfit..!!, I'll have to stock up with Mars Bars..)
 
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ManxTom said:
Just taken delivery of a AEII prism head which I got for a steal price of £70.00 on eBay. It's in immaculate condition, can't find a mark on it and the optics look superb. The only niggle is the 'Auto-Manual' setting dial seems mighty stiff. Could be this is intentional but I have no experience of this prism finder so I can't be certain. Any thoughts chaps? (It certainly adds a good bit of weight to the outfit..!!, I'll have to stock up with Mars Bars..)
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Very uselful accesory..but a warning make sure it's switched off when on the camera as it will drain your battery. :eek:
Have you depressed the centre button when turning to Auto-manual?
 
excalibur2 said:
Very uselful accesory..but a warning make sure it's switched off when on the camera as it will drain your battery. :eek:
Have you depressed the centre button when turning to Auto-manual?
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The RED DOT, lined up, signify OFF I presume? I think I have sorted it now. The actual movement of the knob is a two handed affair. One thumb to press the button in, the finger and thumb of the other hand to rotate the dial. It was turning OK but the button wasn't clicking out.. until I was a little more forceful with it. It seems like it's a failsafe design in that the button only clicks out when the dial alignment is right the way round (either M or A).
I was expressing a little too much conservatism with my new 'toy', being a bit too gentle. Thank you for your comments.
 
Well I bit the bullet today and ordered a strap for my ETRSi. I chose to go with the Smallrig Universal strap as the tethers appear slightly longer than others I looked at. This way I will be able to leave the tethers in place and remove the strap quickly and easily when I use a tripod.. It should arrive next week so I'll 'report back' on my findings as and when. Cool this is it comes with four tether connectors, two split ring connectors, so either way I can set up the Bronica and my DSLR as well.. Win, win I think..!!

SmallRig camera strap

Have a good weekend guys.
 
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Great thread! I had an ETRS for a short while and really enjoyed it.

I’d like an SQ-A but they’re getting a bit thin on the ground now and the price seems to have risen quite a bit too.
 
wibbly said:
Great thread! I had an ETRS for a short while and really enjoyed it.

I’d like an SQ-A but they’re getting a bit thin on the ground now and the price seems to have risen quite a bit too.
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Indeed they are. I was thinking, first off, about an SQ but I couldn't see any 'deals' that appealed to me. Also I do prefer the 6x.4.5 format, for what it's worth I think the ETRS and the ETRSi are far more aesthetically pleasing. They just look good. SQ prices on eBay have risen sharply in recent months. Hope you get lucky and find one soon.
 
Got my SmallRig strap today. Very impressive indeed. Well put together and sturdy. Works as it should on the Nikon, and appears to be ok on the ETRSi. The proof of the pudding will be when I actually get to go out with the camera. I'm going to order some more connectors as I still have one other DSLR to kit out and I guess they'll come in handy in other ways, like using on my binos.
Don't you just love getting new kit..!!
 
ManxTom said:
Indeed they are. I was thinking, first off, about an SQ but I couldn't see any 'deals' that appealed to me. Also I do prefer the 6x.4.5 format, for what it's worth I think the ETRS and the ETRSi are far more aesthetically pleasing. They just look good. SQ prices on eBay have risen sharply in recent months. Hope you get lucky and find one soon.
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I was lucky, when I decided to get back into MF film 6x6 I snagged a couple of SQ-Ais and a bunch of lenses that set me up, also got an SQ-B as last resort backup, just before the prices started to rocket. Good luck with the search.
 
Well I'm not going to hold my breath on finding something worthwhile, not with prices the way they are right now. I think I'd rather spend the money on film and a scanner, and I need a better tripod too and no damn birthday until October...!!
 
Anyone got a ETRSi horizontal split focusing screen they want to sell? I have a clear one and a diagonal split screen which I can't really get on with. Tried all the usual online places with no luck, so far...
 
Hi all, I’m looking for a Bronny sq-a or ai if anyone knows to one forsale, done the usual search eBay but nothing really floating my boat.
Thanks Chris
 
For ETRS owners..well we all know use the correct lens to save massive cropping, but what if you have to crop? An e.g. for what you could expect from a 50mm lens, a V750 scanner was used and I'm sure a pro lab scanner could get better results, esp as I didn't want to spend too much time getting colours, brightness etc perfect.
Anyway Etrs 50mm lens using very old Fuji Pro400h film:-
ZSQwyhB.jpg


The crop... well IMO it's pushing the lens and film size (6X4.5) to get a sharp picture, so as said try to avoid a large crop.
zL4jIVJ.jpg
 
FishyFish said:
I think I prefer the uncropped version of the two Brian. I like how Monsal Dale is framed by the foreground foliage and summery sky.
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I think I agree but I would just crop out the very bottom where the purple stalks are showing and perhaps a bit off the top to make it a square image.
 
Thanks folks for liking the shots, but it looks like no one was interested in how good a ETRS 50mm lens is or how far you can crop for the shot to be accepted for sharpness (subjective);)
 
excalibur2 said:
Thanks folks for liking the shots, but it looks like no one was interested in how good a ETRS 50mm lens is or how far you can crop for the shot to be accepted for sharpness (subjective);)
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At the moment I only have a 75mm on my ETRSi, but I'm actively looking for a 40mm in good condition. Thus far internet searches are telling me that there are an awful lot more 40mm lenses out there than I expected, and some look real dogs..!! Of course one has to be circumspect about things and I would consider looking for a 50mm lens if I can't find a 40mm that I like.

The colour balance in your photos is nice, as is the general presentation. As I said, earlier, well done Sir.
 
ManxTom said:
At the moment I only have a 75mm on my ETRSi, but I'm actively looking for a 40mm in good condition. Thus far internet searches are telling me that there are an awful lot more 40mm lenses out there than I expected, and some look real dogs..!! Of course one has to be circumspect about things and I would consider looking for a 50mm lens if I can't find a 40mm that I like.

The colour balance in your photos is nice, as is the general presentation. As I said, earlier, well done Sir.
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You need a bit of luck buying a lens from an unknown seller as another way of looking at is:- That well used lens could be from an ex pro who had an excellent copy and used it a lot (because it was so good) or could be from Joe Bloggs who abused it (even a drop say on the lens cap, that could be replaced, could shift the lens elements if unlucky) . Same for a mint lens, it could be mint cos it was a crappy copy and not used much and would be glad to pass it on. There is some truth in... all the best copies of lenses owners keep and all the rest go onto the bay. :eek:
So the shots and crop are from my mint 50 mm, and I'll never know if you could get sharper results unless when I took the the shots there was another guy with me with the same setup and we compared the results , or I could buy about three 50mm lenses do test shoots pick the best one and sell the rest. o_O
Good luck buying your lens of choice.
No one mentions Fuji pro 400h and it shows at least it's VG for scenery..but it's expensive at about £11 plus for 35mm or 120. I always thought pro films should be used immediately but the film I used could be about 12 years old...half the time stored at room temp and other half in the freezer.
 
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excalibur2 said:
You need a bit of luck buying a lens from an unknown seller as another way of looking at is:- That well used lens could be from an ex pro who had an excellent copy and used it a lot (because it was so good) or could be from Joe Bloggs who abused it (even a drop say on the lens cap, that could be replaced, could shift the lens elements if unlucky) . Same for a mint lens, it could be mint cos it was a crappy copy and not used much and would be glad to pass it on. There is some truth in... all the best copies of lenses owners keep and all the rest go onto the bay. :eek:
So the shots and crop are from my mint 50 mm, and I'll never know if you could get sharper results unless when I took the the shots there was another guy with me with the same setup and we compared the results , or I could buy about three 50mm lenses do test shoots pick the best one and sell the rest. o_O
Good luck buying your lens of choice.
No one mentions Fuji pro 400h and it shows at least it's VG for scenery..but it's expensive at about £11 plus for 35mm or 120. I always thought pro films should be used immediately but the film I used could be about 12 years old...half the time stored at room temp and other half in the freezer.
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I was very lucky when I was building my SQ-Ai kit, I got a good 80mm with my first camera then went on to get 65mm 40mm 150mm 250mm and finally 50mm. I had only 2 bad copies, one 65mm which the seller took back and a poor copy of a 50mm that came with my second body but I didn't pay enough for the body, back, wlf and lens to complain so it sits as a parer weight on my desk. I won't bother to try to sell it too much fungus in it.
 
IMO still on topic as it refers to 6X4.5 negs and my V750 scanner (maybe other models too).
Using Epson software and set to 6X4.5 you have two settings, one for thumbnails and other normal, well doing 35mm and thumbnails you get what you see scanning in one go. This is what I got using thumbnails for 6X4.5:-
Annotation 2020-06-13 064959.jpg

Well the way out is to use the normal setting (where you can crop selected images etc) as all images are shown as they should be. Can't be bothered to look into this as I don't use the V750 much.
 
Well today I became a proud owner of the ETRIS, I brought the camera from Paul at Commercial Cameras and it was excellent service and very very helpful, looking forward to going out to use it, however when the rain has passed..
Adjustments.JPG
 
chris. said:
Well today I became a proud owner of the ETRIS, I brought the camera from Paul at Commercial Cameras and it was excellent service and very very helpful, looking forward to going out to use it, however when the rain has passed..
View attachment 285300
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You'll like it and 15 shots is about right i.e. not too long and not to short.....erm well for me ;)
 
I've got an ETRS rather than the i version, and really like it.
 
I've got a similar setup to the one @chris. has, but I've removed the prism finder and speed-grip as they added a lot of weight and bulk. I now mostly use it with a waist-level finder and winding crank. It's very difficult to take portrait orientation photos like this, but the camera is much less unweildy I find. The prism and grip both work well though, and I've still got them in the event I want to use it like a massive 35mm SLR. :)
 
FishyFish said:
I've got a similar setup to the one @chris. has, but I've removed the prism finder and speed-grip as they added a lot of weight and bulk. I now mostly use it with a waist-level finder and winding crank. It's very difficult to take portrait orientation photos like this, but the camera is much less unweildy I find. The prism and grip both work well though, and I've still got them in the event I want to use it like a massive 35mm SLR. :)
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That's the beauty of 6x6 no need to rotate the camera to shoot just frame your shot using the crop lines and crop afterwards if you feel a portrait or landscape image would work better.
 
Hi all, does anyone know what type of shutter release fits the ETRSi can’t seem to find any in eBay
 
chris. said:
Well today I became a proud owner of the ETRIS, I brought the camera from Paul at Commercial Cameras and it was excellent service and very very helpful, looking forward to going out to use it, however when the rain has passed..
View attachment 285300
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It's been posted before and in case you have forgotten:- make sure the AEII is switched off as it will flatten your battery. Also if you want to get an older cheaper 150mm lens....one is supposed to be better optically???? If you get around to buying one it would be the MC 150mm f3.5 and is the one to get, but of course if you see the 150mm f4 at an absolute bargain price it's all subjective.
 
chris. said:
Well today I became a proud owner of the ETRIS, I brought the camera from Paul at Commercial Cameras and it was excellent service and very very helpful, looking forward to going out to use it, however when the rain has passed..
View attachment 285300
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That looks in very nice condition. Hope you have as much fun with yours as I do with mine.
 
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